Crafting a musical mystery of Poe

Thursday

Feb 6, 2014 at 6:43 PMFeb 7, 2014 at 9:04 AM

By Alexander StevensWicked Local Arts correspondent

A musical about Edgar Allan Poe. It sounds like a bad idea. A really bad idea. Maybe one of the worst ideas that anyone has ever had.So it's surprising to learn that director Thaddeus Phillips has spent the past 10 years working on this really bad idea and turning it into something astounding. Inspired by Poe's mysterious last days on Earth, Phillips and his creative partners have crafted "Red-Eye to Havre de Grace," now lauded as a breakthrough musical."At times funny, at times heart-breaking, and from quirky start to haunting finish a feast of entrancing visual allurements, this exquisite show is among the most original musical theater works I have seen in years," wrote New York Times theater critic Charles Isherwood, reviewing a 2012 production of "Red-Eye.""That review brought a lot of attention to the show," says Phillips. "Sometimes you get a great review, but you can tell the reviewer missed the entire point of the show. But [Isherwood] clearly understood what we were trying to accomplish. It was very satisfying."The folks at ArtsEmerson: The World On Stage apparently agree with the review. They bring "Red-Eye to Havre de Grace" to the Paramount Center Mainstage, in Boston, Feb. 13-16.The launching point for the show is the odd and unfinished journey at the end of Poe's life."It was a train ride from Virginia to New York where he was going to get his mother-in-law and then return to Richmond to marry his old high school sweetheart," says Phillips. "But he never got to New York. He ends up dead in Baltimore."When Poe was found in the street and hospitalized in 1849, he was in bad shape, slipping in and out of consciousness, and mumbling cryptically about things that are still the subject of debate. Oh, and he was wearing someone else's clothes. A gothic writer's gothic end."That's the dramatic spark that took us on this journey," says Phillips.Phillips and his collaborators (including music by the Wilhelm Bros. & Co.) were also inspired by the dichotomy between the works that made Poe famous and the ones that he viewed as important. While everyone knows "The Raven" and "The Tell-Tale Heart," fewer readers know "Eureka: A Prose Poem," in which Poe intuitively discusses the nature of the universe and even God. Phillips and the creative team read it and loved it."It's an amazing piece of writing," says Phillips. "It's about the make-up of nature. He breaks down how he believes the world has been constructed. He sees the big picture, socially, philosophically and physically. He even has these neat comments about the United States, talking about the money-loving, greedy part of society. They are radical thoughts. And very contemporary.""Red-Eye" finds humor and poignancy in the fact that Poe thought "Eureka" would change the way people saw the world, but instead they just wanted to hear "The Raven," a poem Poe would have preferred to recite nevermore.The creators also found music. And when it came to writing the songs, they realized they already had a lyricist: Poe. It wasn't his poems that provided the words, it was his letters. A treasure trove of them. The Wilhelm brothers worked Poe's words into their music, and the creative team discovered an inspired way to deliver them. The majority of songs are sung not by Poe, but by a narrator."It kind of highlights his mental state," says Phillips. "No one busts out singing a song like in a traditional musical. They are sung behind him, kind of projecting what's going on in his mind."That creative staging adds to the show's haunting look, crafted by Phillips, who also designed the show.Solving design problems "is one of the things I love about theater," says Phillips, who was born, raised and educated in Colorado. "If you read the play, it looks like a screenplay [with multiple locations], so how do you re-create that onstage? You need to make a train station, train compartments, a hotel room. With a big budget, you'd have to build all that crap. But this is very minimal. Just delicate stage images. Very sparse."At the center of it all is Ean Sheehy, who has been getting rave reviews for his portrayal of Poe. (The New York Times called him "simply superb.")"He's just great," says Phillips. "Even at his audition he was really able to express different aspects of Poe's character. Ean can completely go down the crazy path. But he's not just the clichéd dark and troubled Poe, he also finds this mischievous quality that seems to have been part of Poe. Ean is a very playful actor. I remember during rehearsals I would sometimes hear him say something under his breath, just to himself, and I'd think, 'That's so Poe.' "Asked if he ever wonders what Poe would think of "Red-Eye," Phillips doesn't hesitate."I think he would appreciate it more than anything else that's been written about him," he says. "I'm not trying to sound arrogant. But he was a writer, an artist, a creator who was trying to express really interesting things [in 'Eureka'] and no one wanted to listen. We kind of give him the chance to express the things the he really wanted to say."Alexander Stevens is a freelance writer. Follow us on Twitter @WickedLocalArts or like our page on Facebook."Red-Eye to Havre de Grace"WHEN: Feb. 13-16WHERE: ArtsEmerson: The World On Stage at the Paramount Center Mainstage, BostonTICKETS: $25-$75INFO: 617-824-8400; www.artsemerson.org

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